


Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas

by thesilverwitch



Category: Marvel
Genre: Christmas, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-12-02
Updated: 2011-12-02
Packaged: 2017-10-26 18:42:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,446
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/286636
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thesilverwitch/pseuds/thesilverwitch
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It’s December; the streets are packed with people holding their old coats tightly to themselves as they try to hide from the cold, shiny Christmas lights decorate all the trees you can find in New York City, and there are huge decorations hanging from the walls anywhere you look. It’s beautiful, maybe even a little big magical, and the Avengers wished for nothing more than the chance to admire their city at its best, but unfortunately, superheroes rarely get to stop and admire the scenery.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas

**Author's Note:**

> Here's a tiny smut sequel from Steve's perspective - [Let It Snow](http://archiveofourown.org/works/286636)

It’s December; the streets are packed with people holding their old coats tightly to themselves as they try to hide from the cold, shiny Christmas lights decorate all the trees you can find in New York City, and there are huge decorations hanging from the walls anywhere you look. It’s beautiful, maybe even a little big magical, and the Avengers wished for nothing more than the chance to admire their city at its best, but unfortunately, superheroes rarely get to stop and admire the scenery.

They’re on a mission - an incredibly shitty mission. Not shitty as in very boring or very stupid or very ‘can someone please explain to me why the whole team was called to save a kitten stuck in a tree?’. It’s literally a shitty mission, with cow dung everywhere you can lay your eyes on, and giant mutant cows walking around. They aren’t even doing anything purposely destructive, just biting anything that looks green, or edible. But they look scary, and they’re making a huge mess, so the Avengers are now all packed with tranquilizer guns that supposedly could put a whale to sleep – but yet don’t do much to the freaking cows. You have to at least shoot five of the damn things if you want the beasts to tumble to the ground with a loud crash.

Somewhere at the top of a tree, Clint shoves cotton up his nose so he can focus on shooting two guns at the same time instead of vomiting, while muttering ‘what the hell is wrong with evil geniuses these days’. Because really, that’s the biggest problem with a good part of the cases the Avengers are thrown at. They’re usually caused by mad scientists with too much time on their hands and too many self-esteem issues, who need to be the most _original_ and _creative_ mad geniuses of all time, otherwise they’re failing some mystical requirement for the non-existent evil geniuses award show.

It takes two full hours of shooting and running away from tumbling cows as you shoot some more, just for you to slip on the dung that is pretty much everywhere and then having to have the fire department hose you down from their trucks so you can go back and do the whole thing again. In the midst of it all, Clint somehow spots a scrawny looking guy with a t-shirt saying ‘I <3 COWS’ on one of the buildings nearby, looking far too happy at the ordeal happening in front of him. He shoots him with one of the darts, not really caring if he got the right guy or not; Fury will want some explanations and it’s easier to point to the comatose guy than being the one doing them.

 It’s two hours from hell, so when the Avengers are done, they run as fast as they can back to the mansion, purposely avoiding an enraged Fury who wants a full report and some goddamn explanation as to why there are fifty giant mutant cows sleeping and drooling on the streets of New York City. Clint only manages to point in the general direction of where he thought the stupid genius behind all the mess was as Thor picks him by his collar and they fly away.

When they finally arrive, each by their preferred method of transportation (the Hulk just jumps, Tony takes Steve, and Natasha crawls in the shadows or something - nobody really knows how she gets around, and nobody really questions it either). They are all rushing to their enormous private bedrooms with gigantic bathrooms and colossal showers when Steve speaks.

“Guys? I thought we were watching Home Alone tonight. It’s Tuesday…” Because on Tuesdays the Avengers all get together to watch a movie, they even had a system so that everyone got the chance to pick a movie. And of course, tonight, had to be Steve’s night.

It’s usually quite fun; there’s popcorn and some snacks, everybody enjoys themselves and it’s usually something everyone wants to do - just sitting there with their friends, who were quickly becoming more and more like a family, and just watching some TV. Problem is, their friends at the moment stink like shit - literally.

So unless they can all somehow magically transform themselves into a bar of soap and some water, no contact would be quite preferable for everyone involved. And if it was with anyone else picking the movie, this is what would have happened; but it’s not anybody, it’s Steve. Steve with his big blue eyes and his puppy face, who makes you wanna cuddle him and tell him everything is going to be alright. It’s hard saying no to Steve, or maybe that’s just how Tony feels as he looks at his friends around the room.

Everyone else seems adamant on running way - except for Thor, but to him the smell of shit is probably just another one of earth’s “mystical beauties that the mortal soul has not yet fully appreciated!”. Clint, the bastard, even has a foot out of the hall where they had all stopped to look at Steve.

And really, Tony blames it on the eyes - he’s always had a soft spot for big blue eyes and it’s not his fault Steve looks so much like a really adorable child, and maybe _just maybe_ , he wants to do something for Steve. But that doesn’t really matter, because if anyone asks Tony will say he truly wants to see Home Alone. So although what Tony really wants is a nice long bath, a cup of coffee, and some good quiet hours of work in the workshop, he decides against it.

“I think that everyone should take a shower, and then come back for the movie?” He doesn’t wait for a reply, because if he did somebody might make an objection, and that’s just not how things work. “Jarvis, could you tell the cooking staff to prepare us some snacks?”

“Certainly, sir.” The smile Steve gives him is totally worth Clint’s kick to his leg as they all walk grumbling towards their bedrooms; well, Bruce kind of slowly drags himself. Poor guy, he didn’t even have a t-shirt.

After thirty long minutes of scrubbing and using all the soap they could possibly find, the Avengers are clean - or at least they look and smell clean, which is good enough, because Tony knows he’ll never be able to get rid of the feeling of being trapped by a two-meter high pile of cow dung. They finally make it down to the living room some time later (Clint has to technically be forced out of his bedroom by Thor and Tony after trapping himself inside while shouting ‘I JUST WANT SOME FUCKING SLEEP YOU LUNATICS, GO AWAY’ which Tony properly replied with ‘NO WE PROMISED STEVE’ and then Clint shouting back ‘YOU’RE THE ONE WITH THE BOY-CRUSH, NOT ME STARK’, and then Tony gets really annoyed so he tells Thor to just break the door because even if he does have a crush on Steve that is  _none_  of Clint’s business).

Meanwhile the brand new cooking staff, led by a Portuguese lady with a hand of steel, prepares them all some candy canes and gingerbread, because it’s December and Christmas food goes wonderfully with the house’s atmosphere. There’s a huge Christmas tree in the hall, lights all around the walls, and random pieces of decoration pretty much everywhere. Tony and Steve had spent a day putting the whole thing together, even though normally Tony would have just hired someone to do it - but Steve had insisted on them doing it together and well, he just couldn’t resist.

In the mix of all the delicious cookies and candy there were also a bunch of disguised vegetables, because otherwise the meal would be too unhealthy and go against the Avengers diet plan. They were really well disguised though, and only Natasha noticed they weren’t real candy.

Everyone has their own designated seat on the living room: Thor sits on the floor, because he’s like a giddy child when he watches movies, and there are already two broken sofas from his jumping ‘adventures’; Natasha sits in one of the armchairs; while Clint perches on the edge of the other like a weird hawk - for some reason he doesn’t like to just sit on it like a normal person, and nobody knows why, and nobody really cares either; Bruce sits on the right side of the big sofa, Steve in the middle and Tony on the far left. In the middle of the room, they have the coffee table with all the delicious food - it’s also decorated with little penguins on ice skates who actually skate along the glass that Tony had built.

They all manage to watch the movie relatively quietly for twenty minutes - but then the little kid loses his family, and Steve makes this huge gasp as if he didn’t already know that would happen. He turns to Tony with this really shocked face, probably expecting Tony to say something along the lines of ‘no it’s okay Steve, it’s just a bad joke’ but Tony has his hand stuffed in his mouth as he tries his best not to laugh, because at the same time Clint had reached for a gingerbread but instead he picked up the penguin, and he actually tried to swallow it. His face was turning this delightful shade of purple, and Tony knows he shouldn’t laugh, but he was never very good at doing the right thing to begin with.

From then on, it’s all a mix of bad jokes from Clint - who was saved with a kick in the neck by Natasha - with Bruce being the only one laughing for some mystical reason (well, Thor laughs too, but he’s probably just doing it because he enjoys hearing the sound of his own voice. The chances of Thor actually getting a reference from the movie Grease seemed quite small to everyone involved.) Natasha looks unamused, but if you caught her unguarded you can see the hint of a smile at the corners of her lips, and you know she’s enjoying herself even if she doesn’t show it.

Tony on the other hand is enjoying himself far too much to be normal, especially if you consider the fact that he now has a reindeer hat on his head, and Steve has a matching one. They both appeared ‘magically’ out of thin air and Steve had insisted on wearing them, because Steve loved Christmas so much it was almost a bit unreal. He didn’t even care much about the religious part of it; he just really liked the food, the decorations, the opportunity to wear silly clothes without being judged - but most of all, he liked the spirit. And Tony, well, he told himself he liked the spirit for Steve, and he told anyone else he did because he was just keeping Steve company. But in all honesty, he did because for the first time in his life, he could.

It’s not like he had never had the chance to celebrate Christmas before; he had celebrated plenty of Christmases, but he had never experienced a _real_ Christmas. His father had always been too busy, and his mother had to tag along to all the expensive parties and business events, leaving Tony behind all alone in a very big house with no lights, no trees, no anything.

Speaking about past Christmas experiences - Tony isn’t very sure on how the conversation got to the point where everyone is talking about how they used to spend their Christmases; he just knows that they’re all doing it and that he can’t help listening closely to everyone.

Thor tells them of a special holiday in Asgard that is somewhat similar to Christmas, except there isn’t much snow, and instead of Jesus or anything like that, you have the battle of Odin against the ice giants. There are apparently many holidays in Asgard celebrating the great battle though, and this is just one of them. The only thing really particular about it is that they make pudding, and according to Thor, that is totally like Christmas.

Natasha tells a small story of her times in Russia, it lacks details throughout but she speaks fondly of her family without ever mentioning their names, or who they really were. It’s a bit hard not to feel drawn to her as she speaks, but as soon as she’s done telling her story and somebody else takes over, you feel like everything she said was erased from your memory with a charm.

Next up is Clint, who speaks about the madness of Christmas in the circus. He and his brother had to fight the other kids for the decent candy. Everyone was always on the run to _make this_ and _fix that_ so they could be ready for the next show; it sounds like a really crazy place to be, but according to Clint the madness of it all was truly the best part. In the circus, you can always be alone if you want to; there’s always one little corner you can hide in. Clint preferred the empty field next to the elephant cages, it gave him enough space to train his bow skills, but it was also a bit dangerous because at any moment he could shoot one of the elephants or something and cause a major loss to the circus but Clint never really thought about that tiny little detail.

Everyone notices that Clint speaks incredibly fondly of his time there, even though from what Tony has heard, his friends in the circus almost killed him because of their own stupid mistakes.

Bruce only spoke of a Christmas where his father had been away on a business trip, so it was just him and his mother - he said he had the time of his life. They got the chance to decorate the house, make cookies, and just be together as a mother and son, without Bruce’s alcoholic father. 

Steve told them about his Christmases with all of his family and Bucky’s family; back then Christmas was the only time people really got the chance to get the whole family together and celebrate. His house was always fully packed, and more often than not he had to share a bed with Bucky, since they lived on the same floor and it was more practical for their families. After receiving their very small, very precious presents from their families, they would usually go out into the city and just enjoy the rich people’s extra generosity, who always gave them each a couple of coins without them even asking, so they could get some candy later.

When Steve finishes talking, its Tony’s turn to tell his own story, and Tony truly doesn’t know what to say. He knows he wants to say something, maybe tell a good Christmas story to go along with all the others. He knows he definitely has a couple of ones from parties and late night adventures worth telling, except they aren’t really Christmas stories, they’re just stories that occur in December. They’re simply tales of his past as an alcoholic billionaire. Each one of his friends’ stories had their good points, even if they brought back not so good memories; but Tony, he didn’t even have those, he didn’t have Christmas stories. So he told the other Avengers that, hoping they could move on from that topic quickly and resume watching the movie.

“I didn’t really celebrate Christmas.”

“What? Why not? You’re rich!” Clint says and Tony can only stare at him because what does being rich have to do with anything. Sometimes Tony wondered how broken Clint’s brain must really be, all that jumping and running around like a maniac can’t be doing him any good.

“Yeah, well Howard and Maria” – because Tony hadn’t called either of his parents as Mom and Dad their deaths - “were always too busy so I used to just… Be alone. I mean, I had the staff, but they were all kind of afraid of me because of the explosions and stuff.” Tony waves his hand around the air as he talks, trying to demonstrate how really he doesn’t care about the fact that his family never gave a shit about him.

A long time passes where no one talks, and Tony concludes everyone is just done with him, as weird as that might sound - because usually the Avengers aren’t so good at picking up hints and lettings things go. 

“So you never celebrated Christmas?” Steve asks quietly, because of course he couldn’t just leave it alone. Tony dimly notices how everyone is looking at him with a mix of pity and empathy.

“No… and it’s not a big deal, really. Look, can we just get back to watching the movie?”

Nobody says another word as they turn their attention back to the movie, but the atmosphere in the room has never felt tenser to Tony, who excuses himself to the bathroom in the middle of a suspense scene and doesn’t come back.

It’s not like he’s hiding, no, of course not. And during the next few days, all the Avengers look at him with a mix of pity and sadness - and then it stops being just the Avengers. Happy and Rhodey start to look at him like that, even Pepper, who usually doesn’t really care about Tony’s whining, begins looking at him with pity in her eyes when Tony stops by the office. Hell, even Coulson looks at him with a little bit of pity - and the guy didn’t blink an eye as he slaughtered the cats with poisoned claws last month.

Tony hates it; he hates their pity, and he hates their stupid looks, because he’s a grown fucking man - more importantly, he’s a genius, a billionaire! He doesn’t need anyone’s pity. So what, he didn’t celebrate any holidays when he was a kid? He had tons of parties when he got older, and he moved on from the past memories like a badass motherfucker. That has to be worth something right?

Wrong.

It doesn’t. In fact, it only makes things worse for Tony, who tried explaining this to Steve the next night as the two of them watched Parks and Recreation on TV.

“Look, it’s fine Steve, really. I had a bunch of awesome parties when I got older that totally make up for it!”

“Parties with alcohol, Tony? With women who only care about your name, and with people you don’t even know?” Tony grimaces because well, yeah, they were _that_  kind of parties.

“Don’t worry, me and the others are going to fix it.” Says Steve, without even looking at Tony.

“Fix it? Fix what?”

“It’s a surprise.”

“A surprise?” Dammit, Tony really hates surprises. “What kind of surprise? Steve, what are you talking about? What are you and the others doing? _Steve_!” And Steve, being the stubborn bastard he truly is, doesn’t answer Tony. Instead he just grins and continues watching TV, leaving Tony to mope in the other corner of the couch.

His brain is already running through all the possibilities of what his friends are going to try and fix. Go back in time and make Howard pay attention to him? As far as Tony was aware, it isn’t possible to travel through time - but then again, there are now giant mutant cows in the world. Who knows what is and isn’t possible?

He tries to ask Steve a couple more times, but the other man just ignores him completely. After the twenty third failed attempt at trying to find out what the hell was going on, Tony gives up and goes to his workshop where he can sulk and question everything alone.

Tony manages to stay in the workshop for two full hours, before SHIELD calls in reporting a major bank robbery, and even though bank robberies aren’t usually the type of situation the Avengers are called in for, this one seems to be different. According to the witness, the robbers have special freeze ray guns and the police can’t get anywhere near the building without being, well, frozen.

It’s a nasty situation, with a lot of running from side to side and sneaking up on the robbers inside the building, but the Avengers manage to catch the bad guys in the end without anyone getting hurt. As per usual, as soon as the robbers are cuffed and stuffed inside the police car, they are out of the scene; the last thing anyone wants after having at least one of their body parts frozen is for Fury to get a hold of them. It’s not that they’re afraid of Fury; it’s totally not that, it’s just that those goddamn reports are always awfully big and boring to fill. Also the Hulk is hungry, and the last thing you want in the streets of New York City is a hungry Hulk.

When they arrive at the mansion, Tony remembers that he hasn’t asked anyone else about the ‘surprise’ they are supposedly giving him. Unfortunately, as soon as the words come out of his mouth everyone is scrambling away, including Thor, who looks like he’s in a bout of self-conflict over telling Tony what he wants or keeping the secret. Thor was never really good with secrets; but lucky for him, Steve pushes him away before he gets the chance to think too much about his inner conflict, leaving Tony feeling even more frustrated than before. 

The next couple of days go by in a blurry haze of more evil people trying to do evil things that aren’t even that evil, just generally annoying. Tony tries to question everyone in the house about the surprise, but they all seem to be decided on not telling him no matter what. It’s incredibly infuriating, because Tony is really not used to people not telling him stuff - for fuck’s sake, he’s Tony Goddamn Stark, he’s rich, and aren’t people supposed to give you everything they have when you’re rich?

Tony was pretty sure that’s how it was. He tries to be constantly on his guard, so that when the surprise really comes he isn’t surprised; but it’s too hard, even for him, to pay attention to all the little details 24/7, so after a while Tony just starts to quietly resent everyone and everything, including Steve, and he stops questioning it.

Of course, the moment Tony stops caring is also the moment when the bloody surprise happens, and what a surprise it was. Saturday morning, the twenty fourth of December; the Avengers have the weekend off (though that doesn’t really mean anything at all, since they _are_ superheroes and crime doesn’t have a schedule, unfortunately). Tony was planning on maybe going to a spa, just so he could relax a bit, and stay away from the madness and the annoying people who won’t tell him what he wants. He has a party booked for the night, something related to the company that Tony couldn’t give a bigger fuck about, but Pepper had said it was important and well, it’s not like he had better plans.

Tony wasn’t sure what all the other Avengers were doing for Christmas - since he’d decided not to talk to any of them days earlier - but he didn’t care either. Nope, not a single care in the world, they could all go out and have fun all by themselves because Tony didn’t care for them. At all.

He’s still in bed, quietly sulking in his own melancholy when he hears someone knocking on his door.

“Tony, are you up?” It’s Steve, it always has to be Steve.

“No.” He grumbles against his pillow, and Steve, with his super-hearing magic powers, manages to hear him.

“Put some clothes on. We have plans for today.”

Plans? “What plans?”

“Your surprise.” And that’s all Tony needs to hear for him to anxiously jump out of bed, just to crash back on it two seconds later. Damn his weak body and it’s incapacity to have energy in the morning.

“Also, I brought coffee.” Says Steve, as he puts a steaming mug on Tony’s beside table. He completely startles Tony, who was too busy wondering what the easiest tactic to    
roll out of bed without humiliating or hurting himself, to notice him entering the room.

“Oh, and here’s one of your presents - you have to wear it, otherwise you can’t get your surprise.” Steve throws something at Tony’s face, and then he’s out of the room as quickly as he had entered it.

Tony slowly pulls the fluffy piece of clothing off his face so he can get a better look. It’s a sweater, a very red [Christmas themed sweater](http://tonysboner.tumblr.com/post/13507146808/joannaestep-i-want-one-of-these-too), with white snowflakes and a huge yellow stripe passing through it. 

It looked awful, like something Tony wouldn't be caught dead wearing. But Steve said he needed to wear it if he wanted to see his surprise, and even though for the past week Tony had been constantly telling himself that he didn't really want a surprise, that he was perfectly fine without knowing what the others had prepared for him and that surprises were “stupid evil things that only kids like and I'm not a kid, I don't need it and I'm totally not curious either shut up Jarvis, you don't know anything”, he was actually quite curious.

So he puts on the sweater, a clean pair of pants and drank the whole mug of coffee in less than a minute without even burning his tongue. When he steps out of his bedroom, Steve’s standing there, along with Clint and Thor who’re both smiling like they had just won the grand prize for sassiest comeback and best hairstyle, respectively.

They’re also wearing matching sweaters to Tony's one. Clint’s was purple with a horizontal line of green trees; Steve had a red, white and blue one; and Thor had a shiny yellow one with a penguin wearing a Christmas hat. They look absolutely ridiculous, but Tony can't deny that Steve looks a little bit adorable - but not very adorable, only a little bit. Because he’s still kind of mad at Steve for not telling him what the surprise is.

"Hum, what's going on?" Tony asks.

"We're here for your surprise?" Replies Clint easily.

"Yes, for the surprise!" Says Thor, bouncing on his heels. He looks so goddamn excited, like a tiny child on Christmas. Which was kind of accurate, except Thor was one or two millennia old, though Tony had a feeling one or two millennia in Asgardian years was about five in human years.

"Oh for fuck's sake, can somebody please just tell what the surprise is?" Tony didn't quite shout, though he didn't quite speak calmly either. The others only chuckled, _chuckled_ , at his small rage fit, and Steve finally answered him after completely ignoring Tony's persistant questioning for the past few days.

"Well, you said you'd never had a proper Christmas. So we got you one."

"You got me what?"

"A proper Christmas, Tony. Jeez, for a genius you really aren't that bright." Clint says, looking like he had much better things to do than standing in the middle of a hall talking to Tony; but then again, he always looked like that.

"We are taking you out on a walk through the city, and ride thy moving horses on a circling ride!"

"On a _what_?" Tony looked at Steve, who seemed to be the sanest of the group, though not by much.

"A carousel ride in Central Park. Then we're drinking hot chocolate, and eating only Christmas related food for lunch. During the afternoon, we were planning on going to a couple of toy stores and just well, go crazy." Steve hastily adds a continuation to his explanation before Thor, who seemed to be getting more excited by the minute, got new ideas. "A safe and respectable crazy, just buying completely normal toys. No horses or anything. And then at night, we have a Christmas party with everyone."

Tony blankly stares at Steve for a couple of seconds, trying to figure out exactly what Steve had meant.

"So you're all… Taking me out for a Christmas?"

"Basically, yeah." Replies Steve as he scratched the back of his head shyly. He looked a bit anxious, and Tony realized that he was most likely the one behind the surprise, behind all _this_ \- he'd been the one planning a real Christmas just for him.

"Also I talked to Fury, so unless half the world blows up, we're free for the day." Tony was still kind of just staring and trying to figure out things, because it would be a lie to say the possibility of his friends throwing him a party or something like that hadn't crossed his mind - of course it had, everything had crossed Tony's mind, but he didn't actually think a Christmas themed day, or whatever this crazy day was supposed to be, was the real thing.

"So are we going or what?" Clint groans impatiently; because the guy always manages to be a major mood killer without even trying.

"Yeah, we're going." Tony smiles brightly as he leaves his bedroom behind to follow his friends, who were already skipping along the halls. He was so lucky it was still incredibly early (10a.m was early for him, okay) otherwise his body might have been able to properly respond to what his friends had just offered him, and he might, _might_ have shed one tear or two. It's not that Tony was a particularly emotional man; it's just that no one had ever done something like this for him.

-+-

Everything goes well, somehow - probably by the work of some kind of superior power. Tony can't recall another time where the Avengers all went out just trying to relax and everything went okay; usually there's always some kind of evil criminal out and about doing stupid and unnecessary stuff, and they're the ones stuck with dealing with it. But this time, and for the first time ever, everything’s perfect.

Though he won't admit it, Tony knows Steve had booked some seats on the carousel earlier for them; otherwise there would be no way they would get through the line for the main carousel in Central Park in less than two minutes. Thor got the teacup as his seat, which was coincidentally the biggest one available, and probably the only one that could take his weight. Clint got the seahorse, while Tony and Steve shared a Christmas hat turned upside down.

After that, they all bought hot chocolate, just as planned, and had lunch in a restaurant that served only Christmas themed food, also earlier booked by Steve. Tony found it adorable, incredibly adorable, that Steve would go out of his way to book all this stuff just for him. He didn't dare to think of what this day was going to do to his already huge crush on the other man; Tony had never really cared for someone else so much before, and the worst part was that Steve - with his amazing smiles that seemed to be just for Tony, and the way he seemed to talk to Tony as if he was the most important guy ever - might like him too. Tony wasn't very experienced with having real friends or real relationships; but when somebody planned a whole Christmas themed day and dragged everyone you know into it, well it has to mean something more, right?

Afterwards, they go to five different toy stores; and in all of them, Tony spends thousands of dollars - both on toys for himself, and for random charities the stores are linked to. The most impressive thing he buys is the one-meter high remote-control helicopter, even though he could build himself a real helicopter any day at any time - but it's way funnier to just buy one, even if it could only fly at 15 miles per hour. Tony could fix that tiny detail later anyway.

Thor manages to sneak away while Tony and Clint argue over who should play with the helicopter next in the middle of the shop, and he somehow manages to find a real-size stuffed horse. When he gets back to them, carrying the huge animal in his hands as if it was just another toy, Tony can do nothing else but explode into hysterical giggles, mostly because of the look on Steve and Clint’s faces.

 "Thor, where did you even find that?" Steve asks with his arms crossed in front of his chest, and he doesn't look very pleased with Thor's new toy, though there's the hint of a smile on his lips.

"In the animals with stuffing section! Can I have it?"

"Sure thing big guy, you can have anything you want." Replies Tony without even thinking; Thor just looks so happy with his new toy.

"But that doesn't even fit in our car, and he can't just fly home with a giant horse - people will start saying we're creating hybrids again." Tony shuddered at the thought of being faced with the hybrids story again; really, you take one orphaned mutant tiger home with you, and suddenly all heads are turned to you as if you’ve just done the most scandalous thing ever.

"I shall walk home with it!" Thor says enthusiastically, and Steve still doesn't look very convinced, so Tony tries to help the situation a little bit.

"Okay, but only if Cupid here goes with you."

"Hey-" Clint tries to complain, but he chokes on his own words as Thor grabs him by his collar and starts dragging him away into the crowd.

"Let us go then, farewell my friends; we shall see you back at the castle!"

"Wait, I don't wanna go with him, it's a one hour walk!" But neither Steve nor Tony are listening to Clint’s protests as they get inside the car.

The streets are packed with people rushing from place to place, so they get trapped in the traffic - luckily Steve came prepared for this kind of situation, and there’s a pile of ten Christmas DVDs for them to watch in the car’s truck. Tony picks Home Alone 2, because they might as well watch the New York themed one while they’re stuck in the streets of New York. He spends the next hour in Steve's quiet company, who sometimes sneaks glances at Tony and just smiles at him without even being shy about it. It’s like being stuck in a romantic teenage love story, except you aren't very sure if it's love, or if the guy you want is just really, really friendly because he's goddamn Captain America.

When they finally got to the mansion, Clint and Thor had already arrived. The proof of this was the simple fact that Clint was lying at the entrance of their house, gasping for breath with his clothes all wet.

"Thor - dragged me - ducks." He looks like he’s dying, and Tony feels a little bit bad for him - a feeling that quickly goes away as Bruce arrives back from his small trip to visit an old friend in Virginia, and drags Clint away to his room while promising him a nice and long warm bath.

"Get changed, the party starts in one hour." Steve tells Tony as he heads for the kitchen.

"Party? What party?"

"The Christmas party with everyone. I told you about it earlier"

"Is this the party Pepper said I was supposed to go? Also, who's everyone?"

"Yes, and everyone-" Steve pops his head back into the entrance hall. "is everyone. I got you a nice suit, now go." And Tony did as he was asked.

The suit Steve got him is red, deep velvet red, and Tony’s sure it was going to look incredibly corny and stupid on him - but he also doesn’t really care, because Steve’s the one doing this all for him, and right now he’d probably do anything for him. The suit turns out to be perfectly cut for his body, and as Tony does a spin in front of the mirror, he realizes that it actually doesn’t look bad; in fact, it even looks somewhat good. Or maybe he was just drunk on happiness and hot chocolate, and his brain had already lost the ability to process what was good and bad - either way, he didn’t care.

“Tony, are you ready?” Steve’s knocking on his door for the second time today, and for the second time again, Tony has to reply to him with a no.

“I just can’t – get – this dammed bowtie right.” Steve had also gotten him a yellow bowtie, but Tony’s only used to the fake bowties with clips that you can just pin to your clothes. Yeah he was a genius, but he was also a genius who never learned how to properly tie a bowtie.

 “Here, let me.” Steve stood awfully close to Tony as he fixed the offending piece of clothing, his eyes focused and his hands precise, leaving Tony to just stare at him. The lights in his bedroom are turned off, though Tony can’t really recall turning them off, and there’s snow quietly falling outside his window to the ground. 

“Thanks for today, Steve.”

“No problem.”

“No, I mean it… just, thank you, for everything really.” Steve finishes tying the bowtie but his hands remain on Tony’s collar as he looks Tony right in the eyes, and he’s so close, Tony can only feel this impossible warmth radiating off him.

“You’re welcome.” And then this wonderful thing happens; this amazing brilliant thing, where Steve inches forward just a little bit, without ever taking his eyes off Tony, and kisses him on the mouth. Just a small, gentle peck that was more than enough to signal all the lights green and for Tony to lunch forward into Steve.

Steve holds Tony by his hips while Tony’s arms snake around Steve’s shoulders, and the kiss deepens considerably; Steve licks Tony’s bottom lip, asking for permission, and Tony willingly giving it without a second thought. A million thoughts run through Tony’s mind; a mix of _yes oh my god finally_ and _he tastes like candy_ , but he can’t focus on any of them as Steve licks behind his teeth and makes Tony’s whole body shiver.

“I’ve been dying to do that.” Says Steve into Tony’s lips, their faces still only inches apart.

“Me too.” 

Steve smiles brightly as he grabs Tony’s hand, starting to drag him out of the bedroom. “C’mon, we got a party to attend to.” 


End file.
